Coaching lifts maternity returns to 90%

If you need a business case for supporting parents through leave, Jennifer Liston-Smith of Bright Horizons gave one with numbers attached.

The numbers

When employers put parental leave coaching in place, whether group or one-to-one coaching, a parental leave toolkit or manager training, maternity return rates tend to rise by around 12 to 14 percentage points above the national average of about 77%. That can take returns to around 90%.

Liston-Smith estimated the saving at perhaps £150,000 in a firm of 1,000 people, from the cost of replacing people who would otherwise not return.

What to do this week

• Find your own maternity return rate, and your retention rate a year after return.
• Compare it with the 77% benchmark.
• Cost the gap using your replacement cost per leaver.

Source: Bright Horizons Parental Leave and Family Support Benchmark, as presented in the webinar.

Read the clip transcript

when people put parental leave coaching programs in place as Leah and Carrie have both described whether that's group coaching one-to-one coaching parental leave toolkit manager training those kind of interventions you tend to get an improvement in maternity return rates of about 12 to 14 percentage points above the national average there's more in the benchmark about how you would actually calculate that the national average is about 77% so you might get up to 90% and that's going to be a cost saving maybe £150,000 in a firm of 1000 people the workings are shown in the benchmark around that so that's another thing to get a fix on too to get your return rates because you will see those rise as people become convinced that the culture recognizes that having children does not have to be a career watershed moment